Genre: Drama?
Premise: In 1992 a seaplane crash in a lakefront community sparks a relationship between three young sisters and the mysterious, injured female pilot.
About: This script finished Top 30 on last year’s Black List. Jessica Granger has been writing on some TV shows over the last few years. Most recently, she wrote an episode of the La Brea.
Writer: Jessica Granger
Details: 103 pages
There are some scripts you pick up and, within minutes of finding out what they’re about, know there’s very little chance of you liking them. They just aren’t your thing. And that’s fine. Not every movie has to be for everyone. But this is where it becomes challenging to review a script because if you’re bored by the subject matter, it can be hard to gauge whether the script is any good or not.
I do know this. Regardless of whether I enjoy the subject matter, I can tell when dialogue is good. I can tell when a writer’s voice is fresh and unique. I didn’t like the highly controversial screenplay, “Get Home Safe.” I, in fact, hated it. But there’s no way I was denying that voice. That voice was stronger than any script that came out that year.
So I guess I’m saying, there are ways to determine if a script has value even if the subject matter isn’t to your liking. And that’s what I’ll be looking for today.
The year is 1992. It’s rural Connecticut. A beautiful place with lots of trees and lakes. But you wouldn’t know if it you talked to our 16 year old protagonist, Isla. Isla hates Connecticut and wants nothing more than to get out of this miserable town as soon as possible. Her younger sisters Elliot (13) and June (10) are a little more tolerant of their town. But maybe they just need to catch up to Isla in age and then they’ll want to escape as well.
One day, while canoeing in their lake, a small plane crashes in the nearby water. They hurry over and help the pilot, Sky (30s, half African-American), until the boat medics can show up. Later, they learn that Sky is the daughter of some guy from around here who just died. That and she’s really mysterious. She left here when she was Isla’s age and hasn’t been back since!
The mystery is answered not long after it’s posed. Sky is gay. And her father didn’t approve. So she ditched town and became a bush pilot. That’s not a play on words, I promise. She came back for the funeral and, once she’s heeled up, she’s going to leave again.
The girls take an interest in Sky, especially Isla, who finds her cool and empowering. So they make up two excuses to hang around her. One, Isla wants to interview Sky for a local radio show she does. And two, they’re going to help her fix up the crashed plane so it can fly again. Sky is resistant at first, but eventually warms to Isla, seeing a bit of herself in her, and the four develop a friendship, if only for this one summer.
So, since I can tell you’re all dying to know: Did the script make up for the subject matter with a strong voice and kick-ass dialogue?
Unfortunately, no. The dialogue was standard. And I would actually categorize this as the poster child for a voice-less script. That sounds like a diss but it actually isn’t. Not every script needs the overly-inflected voice of its author telling the story with flash and panache. One of my favorite directors ever, Robert Zemeckis, was known for having no voice. He just wanted to tell a good story.
But therein lies the problem with Candlewood. I just don’t think it’s a good story. It took me forever to figure out what the story actually was. For a long time it seemed like it was about three sisters getting to know a random bland 30 year old woman. There were no goals. The stakes were lower than sea level. And the urgency was non-existent.
Eventually, I realized, it was a coming-of-age story.
It was about this girl, Isla, trying to figure out what to do with her life. A young person living in a small town that they want to escape is the pre-text for some successful movies. But it was all told in this really blasé casual way where nothing ever felt that important.
I think that Sky being gay was supposed to be this intense plot point that made the story feel big and important. But there are so many movies and TV shows covering this subject matter right now that sexual preference goes right through the front of the head and out the back for the large majority of audience members. You gotta give us more than “Character X is gay” to move the interest needle.
I think the big mistake this script made was one I encounter every so often. Which is that when you write these “stuck in a small town coming-of-age” stories, the tendency is to have the story mirror the slow lazy environment of the setting. But if you do that, you risk the story feeling too casual. Which is exactly what this felt like.
One of the ways to offset this is to include some monster stakes. Make the stakes sky-high. That way even though the story is slow, we feel like it’s building toward an important conclusion. Sky had zero stakes attached to her story. And I didn’t give a crap if Isla left town or not. To be honest, I found her ungrateful. She grew up in this idyllic town and her single mother is doing everything she can to prepare her for life and it’s not enough for her.
When it comes to coming-of-age stories, I much prefer when writers come up with a PLOT. Instead of plopping your characters down in a town and having them wander about, dealing with whatever randomness comes up that day, give them something big and important to do. The classic example that comes to mind is Stand by Me. They could’ve easily written that movie so that the four kids stayed in town and dealt with jerky bullies for 2 hours. But by creating this road-trip aspect, they provided their coming-of-age movie with purpose and structure. Going on that trip to find the dead kid is what made it feel like a movie.
I think the hope here was that Sky was a strong enough hook to make this a movie. She was, in theory, just as compelling as four kids traveling by themselves through the woods to find a dead body. I couldn’t disagree more. I found her to be both boring and predictable. Again, we’re seeing gay characters doing so much more these days than deal with parents who don’t accept their sexual preference. I feel like that’s a very dated storyline. And yes, I know this is set in 1992, but that doesn’t give you a pass. It’s still dated character storyline.
There wasn’t anything in this script I could connect with, unfortunately.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: I think writers still make the mistake of forgetting that they’re writing A MOVIE. The two hours that someone sits down to watch a movie must be time significantly better spent than doing something else. A movie is supposed to be a special experience. It’s supposed to be something someone leaves thinking, “Wow, am I glad I saw that.” Writing a slow casual story where the biggest plot moments register a 3.3 on the Richter scale, that’s not good enough. Or else write for TV. TV allows for these slower stories to take shape. But not movies. Movies need some thunder behind them. And this script was a light drizzle.
